If a man gets a serious injury, it’s still not fatal, but for women it could end much more seriously.” For good measure, Arefyev added: “Women have another purpose — to have children, to do housework, to create hearth and home.” As jarring as that sounds in 2014, it is that sort of thinking about sex differences and athletic performance that helped keep women’s ski jump out of the Olympics until this year.

If Arefyev could see past his prejudice, he might notice that female biology can be advantageous in his sport.